Self-Edit Mode

When someone asks you what your wildest dreams are, or what your dream job is, how do you react?  Do you excitedly blurt out your heart's desires, painting a luscious picture of what you consider to be your inner fantasies?  Do questions like these light you up and fill you with child-like enthusiasm?  Not me.  I have always found these types of questions to be stressful, hard to answer and almost embarrassing to answer at times.  I stammer, struggle to put out any ideas and often make things up to simply get through the exercise.  I have never admitted that before out loud and only in the past few days have even realized it or admitted it to myself.

This has led me to wonder why.  Why does the idea of dreaming big make me feel so uncomfortable and scared?  Even as I write this I can feel the sensations that this topic conjures up for me...tightening in my chest, defensiveness, and a desire to point the spotlight elsewhere.  I feel like this whole notion of dreaming big and therefore living big has been something I've run away from all of my life.  I am starting to see just how powerful the idea of playing and living small has been for me and how it is affecting me as I move forward in my life.

I think that part of the discomfort I have in this whole area is simply the fear of "what if my dreams are ridiculous or I have the wrong dream?"  What if I tell someone what I am really dreaming of and they laugh at me or think differently about me because of that.  People-pleasing can take many forms and as I write this all I can see and hear is my desire to be liked.  Perhaps it is this desire that kept me from embracing my true self many years ago, and it is likely what has caused me to pursue or not pursue avenues in my life along the way.  What I find so interesting is that all along I prided myself on NOT being concerned with what others think...yet I cannot deny what I am reading and typing out.  

This past weekend I took part in an exercise called Deep Listening, where you sit with a trusted partner and each take a turn speaking out loud the thoughts and feelings that are on your mind, in your heart and perhaps even buried deep within you.  As you speak for your allotted time (roughly 15 minutes) your partner holds space for you without reacting to what you are saying at all.  No head nods, no interruptions for points of view or advice, just silence.  Once your time is up, you return the gift to your partner, acting as a witness for them to speak their truth.  When you have both had a turn you are done.  There is no recapping, no summarizing of what was said, what you heard or anything at all.  The goal of the exercise is to allow you to verbalize what you have been holding onto deep inside and to allow someone else to do the same.  As we discussed the premise of this exercise I could feel myself starting to tighten up...this was NOT a comfort zone exercise for me.  Taking a deep breath and looking away from my computer screen, I started to speak.  Haltingly at first and then as I became more comfortable the words felt like they were streaming out of me.  And as I spoke I felt a weight lift and parts of me unlock that I hadn't even known were constricted.  When my time was up and I was able to sit in silence for my partner, I realized how much of a gift this was and also how often I censor what I say before I even say it.  I have become adept at quickly rewording ideas and contributions to match the situation or audience and to hold back on things that I feel may not be so widely accepted.  While this may serve me in some areas of my life, I know that I have allowed this "skill" to spill over into many areas and at times I feel like the only place I am actually fully open is in my journal.  And even then there are times when I edit that as well, and hold back from letting my feelings flow.    

Knowledge is power.  As I write this post I am feeling a shift in thinking beginning to take place.  A desire to turn off the self-edit mode that I have had in the on position for too long now.  Or at least to allow it to toggle back and forth as is necessary.  A desire to give my dreams some room to breathe and grow, and to embrace the creative, unique and individual way I experience the world and choose to live within it.  Like any new undertaking, this is a process and one that will require some time and loving kindness on my part while I start to explore a life unedited.